This is a complex subject because people complain from both sides. If you announce a game way ahead of its release, people complain that they're waiting too long (see pretty much every Sony exclusive game announced at E3 2016). If you announce a game too close to its launch and too far from the last entry in a series, people start saying that the series is dead (see Fallout 4).

Do you prefer to wait a lot but at least know that a game is coming or to not be sure if a game is coming but not having to wait too much after its announcement?

I'd say roughly a year before release is a good time, that way it shows you're very close to finishing and can roll out a new trailer and/or screenshots every few months to keep people interested until release. Waiting too long puts you at the risk of losing hype, since potential customers may get bored of waiting and move onto something else. Although announcing too late may not give you enough time to build up hype either...

Bristow9091 said:I'd say roughly a year before release is a good time, that way it shows you're very close to finishing and can roll out a new trailer and/or screenshots every few months to keep people interested until release. Waiting too long puts you at the risk of losing hype, since potential customers may get bored of waiting and move onto something else. Although announcing too late may not give you enough time to build up hype either...

So yeah, about a year I'd say.

Yeah, one year seems fair. E3 would be great if it happened in January, so companies could announce games for the holiday season of that same year.

Currently Playing:

That depends a lot on the roadmap. Once the game is announced interest will start to go down in a rate depending on the game and if you don't have a plan to keep interest above whatever critical level you might have you shouldn't announce the game.

Currently Playing:

I normally don't mind if a game is revealed even if it's not coming out soon, I think that's why there are so many CG trailers out there because devs want to let people know they're working on something but don't necessarily have something ready to show yet, but it depends on how long it takes for the game to actually come out.

Sometimes when a game is revealed, but doesn't release for years afterwards, I think it begs the question for some people as to why was it revealed so early then. Does it build hype? Yeah, but I would also argue that it gets tiresome if they were to keep showing the game every year at E3 or something, because then that in itself also begs the question "Oh this game again, how is it not out yet?" or "Why did they show it years ago if it's only coming out this long after?".

Super Mario Odyssey is good example of a game from announcement to release being done well imo. Announced in January, shown again at E3 5 months later, then released in October of the same year. Only 10 months wait from announcement to release, enough time to get people super hyped and get it in their hands the same year.